This invention relates to a floor maintenance machine especially for carpeted floors of commercial buildings such as office buildings, hospitals, airport terminals, schools, nursing homes and the like, and particularly to a unique carpet maintainer that picks up debris and dust, lifts carpet pile in two directions, cleans carpet pile tips with a cleaning solution, and performs these processes with one rapid pass.
Conventional commercial carpet care equipment includes vacuum cleaners for pickup of dust and debris, typically used by frequently, e.g., daily, passing over carpet surfaces, and rotating brush units to pick up carpet pile. These units cannot keep the carpet from becoming soiled and tramped down over a period of time. Therefore, bonnet cleaners are then necessary to wet scrub the carpet. Bonnet cleaning is slow and disruptive of normal use activities in the area of the cleaning operation. As is known, bonnet cleaning is the process of placing a bonnet or a scrubbing pad onto a disc-type floor machine to clean the surface, but only the surface, of the carpet. Moreover, these multiple pieces of equipment must be kept, stored and maintained.
It would be advantageous to be able to constantly maintain carpet in excellent, cleaned, aesthetic condition with minimal time required and minimal disruption of usage of the area. This would be doubly advantageous if it could prevent the carpet from gradually becoming more dirty and unsightly prior to the periodic bonnet cleaning operation.